Take A Thief v(-3 Page 36

  No one had sent Skif back to the Collegium, and he waited beside Alberich, between Kantor and Cymry, listening with all his might to the grim-voiced conversations around him. Most of the Heralds here he didn't know; that was all right, he didn't have to know who they were to understand that they were important. He did recognize Talamir, though, who seemed considerably less otherworldly at the moment and quite entirely focused on the here and now.

  “This is going to have an interesting effect on the Council,” he observed, his voice heavy with irony.

  Alberich snorted. “Interesting? Boil up like a nest of ants, when stirred with sticks, it will! Sunlord! Guildmaster Vatean! Suspect him, even I did not!”

  “Gartheser is going to have a fit of apoplexy,” someone else observed. “Vatean was here was here at his behest in the first place.”

  Hadn't they noticed he was here? This was high political stuff he was listening to!

  :They know,: Cymry told him. :But you're a Herald, even if you aren't in Whites yet. You proved yourself tonight. No one is ever going to withhold any thing from you that you really want or need to know.:

  Well! Interesting…

  “Gartheser will be a pool of stillness compared to Lady Cathal,” Talamir observed, with a sigh. “He was a Guildmaster after all, and she speaks for the Guilds.”

  “Oh, Guildmaster, indeed,” someone else said dismissively. “Becoming a Master in the Traders' Guild…” He left the sentence dangling, but everyone — including Skif — knew that the requirements for Mastery in the Traders' Guild mostly depended on entirely on how much profit you could make. Provided, of course, that you didn't cheat to make it. Or at least that you didn't get caught cheating.

  “He was,” Talamir pointed out delicately, and with a deliberate pause between the words, “quite… prosperous.”

  “And now, know we where the profits came from,” Alberich said harshly. “It is thinking I am that Lady Cathal should be looking into profits, and whence from they come.”

  “And Lord Gartheser,” said Talamir. “Since Gartheser wished so sincerely to recommend him to the Council.”

  “There is that,” observed someone else, in a hard, cold voice. “And now we know where the leak of Guard movements along Evendim came from.”

  “It would appear so,” Talamir replied thoughtfully, “Although… it is in my mind that Lord Orthallen was equally, though less blatantly, impressed with the late Guildmaster's talents…”

  But a flurry of protests broke out over that remark; it seemed that the idea of Lord Orthallen having anything to do with all of this was completely out of the question.

  Except that Skif saw Talamir and Alberich exchange a private look — and perhaps more than that. Looks weren't all that could be exchanged when one was a Herald, and far more privately.

  I wonder what all that's about.

  And Lord Orthallen had “particularly” recommended Jass to Vatean…

  Well, if he wanted to know —

  No, he didn't. Not at all. He knew quite enough already. All of this was going right over his head, and anyway, there wasn't anything one undersized thief could do about it even if he did know.

  Or — if there was something one undersized thief could do about it, he had no doubt that Alberich would have a few words with him on the subject. And maybe a job.

  So, perhaps his roof-walking days weren't over after all.

  Better get myself another sneaky suit.

  :I believe that Alberich already has that in mind,: said Cymry.

  The little group continued to paw over the few facts they had until they were shopworn, and even Talamir, whose patience seemed endless, grew weary of it.

  “Enough!” he said, silencing them all. “There is nothing more we can do until we know more. The boy and Alberich have told us all they know. Herald Ryvial and our picked Guardsmen-Investigators are on their way to Vatean's home even now, and if there is anything to be found there, rest assured, they will find it. Every known associate of Vatean will be under observation before sunrise, long before word of his death leaks out — ”

  “Uncle Londer,” Skif interrupted wearily. Now that the excitement was wearing off, he was beginning to feel every bruise, and was just a little sick.

  “And the man Londer Galko will also be observed,” Talamir continued smoothly. “Because he clearly knew a great deal about the child stealing although he is not connected with Vatean in anyway.”

  Now he looked at Skif, and put a hand on Skif's shoulder that felt not at all patronizing. Comradely, yes, patronizing, no. “Trainee Skif is weary to dropping, Herald Alberich is in pain, and we are fresh and have constructive work ahead of us. I suggest we send them back to their beds while we get about it, brothers.”

  There was a murmured chorus of assent as the Healer put the last of the stitches into Alberich's scalp wound, and the Heralds magically melted away, leaving Skif and Alberich alone in a calm center in the midst of the bustle.

  “You won't travel in a stretcher as you should,” the Healer said wearily, as if he had made and lost this same argument far too many times to bother again. “So the best I can do is order you to back to the Collegium and to rest.”

  “Teach from a stool I will, tomorrow at least,” Alberich told him.

  The Healer sighed, and packed up his satchel. “I suppose that's the most I can get out of you,” he said, and looked at Kantor. “Do what you can with him, won't you?”

  The Companion tossed his head in an emphatic nod, and Skif added, “Jeri an' Herald Visa can run th' sword work for a week — an' Coroc an' Kris can do archery.” Kantor nodded even more emphatically.

  Alberich glared at him sourly, made as if to shrug, thought better of it, and sighed. “A conspiracy, it is,” he grumbled.

  “Damn right,” Skif said boldly. And when Alberich got to his feet and made as if to mount, Kantor stamped his foot, and laid himself down so that Alberich could get into the saddle without mounting. When his Herald was in place, Kantor rose, and shook his head vigorously.

  “You make me an old woman,” Alberich complained, as Skif got stiffly into Cymry's saddle and the two of them headed up the street away from the scene of the activity, riding side by side.

  “Naw,” Skif denied, very much enjoying having the fearsome Weaponsmaster at a temporary disadvantage. “Just makin' you be sensible. Ye see — ” he continued, waxing eloquent, “there's th' difference between a Herald an' a thief. Ye don' have t' make a thief be sensible. All thieves are sensible. A thief that won't be sensible — ”

  “ — a thief in gaol is, yes, please spare me,” Alberich growled.

  But it didn't sound like his heart was in it, and a moment later he glanced over at Skif. “That was one of your mentor — Bazie — that was one of the things he told you, yes?”

  Skif nodded.

  “And now, revenge you have had.”

  True. Jass was dead, Vatean was dead; the two men responsible for Bazie's horrible death were themselves dead. Skif's initial bargain with himself — and with the Heralds — to work with Alberich because they had a common cause was over.

  “Regrets?” Alberich prompted.

  Skif shook his head, then changed his mind. “Sort of. There weren't no justice.”

  “But it was your own hand that struck Vatean down,” Alberich said, as if he were surprised.

  It was Skif's turn to bestow a sour look. “Now, don' you go tryin' that sly word twistin' on me,” he said. “I know what you're tryin' t'do, an' don' pretend you ain't. No. There weren't no justice. Th' bastid is dead, dead quick an' easy, he didn' have t'answer fer nothin', an' we ain't never gonna find out a half of what he was into. I got revenge, an' I don' like it. Revenge don' get you nothin'. There. You happy now?”

  But Alberich surprised him. “No, little brother,” he said gently. “I am not happy, because my brother is unhappy.”

  And there it was; the sour taste in Skif's mouth faded, and although the vengeance he thought he had wanted
turned out to be nothing like what he really would have wanted if he'd had the choice, well —

  I am not happy, because my brother is unhappy.

  That — that was worth everything he'd gone through to get here.

  “Ah, I'll get over it,” he sighed. “Hey, I get t' boss you around fer a week, eh, Kantor? That's worth somethin'.”

  Once again, Kantor nodded his head with vigor, and Alberich groaned feelingly.

  “This — ” he complained, but with a suspicious twinkle in his eye, “ — is putting the henhouse in the fox's charge.”

  “Rrrrr!” Skif growled, showing his teeth. “Promise. Won't have too much chicken.”

  “And I suppose you will insist on going into Whites, now that a hero you are,” Alberich continued, looking pained.

  “Hah! You are outa your head; th' Healer was right,” Skif countered. “What, me run afore I can walk? Not likely! 'Sides,” he continued, contemplating all the potential fun he could have over the next four years in the Collegium, “I ain't fleeced a quarter of them highborn Blues yet, nor got all I can outa them Artificer Blues!”

  Alberich regarded him with a jaundiced eye. “I foresee — and Foresight is my Gift — a great deal of trouble, with you at its center. And that no Trainee in the history of Valdemar will have more demerits against his name, before you go into Whites.”

  “Suits me,” Skif replied saucily. “So long as I have fun doing it.”

  “Fun for you — yes,” Alberich sighed. “Fun for the rest of us, however, extracting you from the tangles you make — ”

  “It'll be worth it!” Skif insisted, once again feeling that giddy elation bubbling up inside him, as he felt the warmth of acceptance encircle him and hold him at its heart.

  And in spite of present pain and future concerns, Herald Alberich gave him a real, unalloyed smile. “Oh, there is no doubt it will be worth it,” he said, and Skif had the sense that he meant more than just the subject of Skif's future mischief. He meant Skif's very existence as one of the Trainees now and Heralds to come, no matter who objected, or how strenuously, to the presence of a thief among them. He confirmed that with his next breath.

  “Welcome, very welcome, to the Collegium, Skif. It seems we were always right to take a thief.”

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